Category Archives: National Adoption Awareness Month

Flipping the Script: Predicting the Future of Intercountry Adoption

Posted on by
Reply

What would you predict about the future of international adoption? Who will be part of creating that future?

I have an article in the November issue of Adoption Today called “Predicting the Future of Intercountry Adoption.” That was the title of a panel I participated on at the Families First Conference last June. The conference was co-sponsored by the now defunct Joint Council on International Children’s Services and the National Council For Adoption.

Adoption Today asked if I would write an article on the same subject for them, and so I did, covering many of the points I offered at the Families First conference. Here is a brief summary of my predictions from a June blog post:

  • Adoptions will continue to decline unless adult adoptees and first families are included in conferences and policy discussions in advocacy groups, Congress, the Hague, and around the world.
  • Adoptions will continue to decline unless fraud and corruption are overtly acknowledged, not just discussed among agency workers.
  • Openness will be the norm in international adoption, and needs to be promoted by agencies as a positive development. That said, openness is complicated.
  • DNA technologies and social media will expand connections between adoptees and their birth/first families.
  • Most international adoptions will be for special needs children, another reason that pre- and post-adoption and resources must be strengthened.

I hope you will take a look at my article and the others in Adoption Today.

Tomorrow, National Adoption Awareness Month (November) begins. While the commentary has historically been dominated by adoptive parents and adoption agencies, the voices of adoptees and first/birth parents are increasingly being heard. The social media movement #FlipTheScript by adoptees was powerful last November in opening eyes and in questioning long-held narratives that included only adoptive parents and adoption agencies.

I’ve no doubts that this November will see an even greater expansion of #FlipTheScript. That’s another hope-filled prediction, and I am looking forward to reading and learning. We need all the voices, and we need to understand that adoption casts a wide net. Engaging and listening are the only ways to create a better future.

May this November truly bring about an increased awareness of the genuine needs of children (who grow up!), and a deeper understanding of the far-ranging realities of adoption.

IMG_0988

Forest, trees: a manipulated, colorful view of reality. © Maureen McCauley Evans

 

Update on Hana Williams: Larry and Carri Williams Have Filed an Appeal to Their Murder Convictions

Posted on by
4
Hana Alemu (Williams)

Hana Alemu (Williams) Photo from Facebook page: Remembrance of Hanna Williams

In late October 2013, Larry and Carri Williams, the adoptive parents of Ethiopian adoptee Hana Williams/Hana Alemu, were convicted and sentenced to jail for Hana’s murder and associated torture. You can read about their sentencing here.

Larry and Carri have filed appeals of the conviction, and the Seattle Appeals Court has scheduled oral arguments for the appeals on Monday, November 16, at 9:30am. I will be there, and I hope many other folks in the Seattle area will be there also. A good showing by the public on Hana’s behalf could be a powerful statement to the judges. Many thanks to all who have kept Hana in their hearts.

I feel certain that many folks in Washington State, in the US, in Ethiopia, and around the globe will be watching this case closely.

We haven’t forgotten you, Hana.

National Adoption Month and Awareness: Flip the Script

Posted on by
4

National Adoption Month begins today, an idea that seems straightforward until you start talking with people about it. Whose stories are heard this month? Whose interests are represented? It’s time to #FliptheScript, and hand over the microphone to new voices.

The North American Council on Adoptable Children (NACAC) says that, in 1990, they began raising awareness of what had been Adoption Week (the week of Thanksgiving) and   started promoting November as National Adoption Awareness Month. The original purpose was to increase awareness about the need for adoptive families for children in US foster care.

National Adoption Awareness Month in the past has been touted almost exclusively by public and private adoption agencies and adoptive parents. Like the adoption tax credit, the original focus on children in US foster care has expanded to promote adoption of children around the globe.

If we are going to do adoption right, we have to take a hard look at it. We need to listen carefully to those who have a wide range of experiences as a result of adoption: the wonderful, the good, the difficult, the traumatic. Adoption is not a Hallmark greeting card or sweet interracial family photo. It’s time to flip that script. The stories and pictures are complex, and that’s okay.

Awareness is key. We need to move toward increased awareness of adoption and of family preservation/reunification. Those are big, complicated, potentially rewarding undertakings. Let’s look beyond cute pictures and platitudes.

Let’s listen to the voices that we can truly learn from: adopted adults. Let’s move the microphone, held in the past and present by adoption agencies and adoptive parents, and hand it to them.

Take a look today on Twitter for #FliptheScript. Listen to the voices of adoptees who love their adoptive families deeply, and who have struggled nonetheless. Listen to those who had horrible, fraudulent experiences, and who have survived.

Listen to those who have been denied the most basic human right–to know who they are–because they are denied the right to access their own original birth certificates.

Look at who is talking about National Adoption Awareness Month. Sure, listen to the agencies and parents. Then give deeply to listening to those who have truly lived what it means to be adopted.

Inverted image of spider web photo, taken by Maureen McCauley Evans

Inverted image of spider web photo, taken by Maureen McCauley Evans

 

 

 

 

Genuine Adoption Awareness: Gazillion Voices, Speaking Out

Posted on by
1

All too often, we think adoption means “babies and children who need families.” That thinking can seem especially true in November, which in the US is Adoption Awareness Month, designed to celebrate adoption and promote positive awareness about adoption. You’ll see lovely photos of happy families, stories about children available for adoption, and upbeat articles by adoptive parents of young children.

Those babies and children grow up. They experience adoption in different ways at different ages, but “being adopted” or “having been adopted” is a part of their lives, always. While adoption does not necessarily define or limit anyone, it certainly affects the understanding of family in a very different way than for those who are not adopted, or have not placed a child for adoption. Transracial and/or international adoption adds a whole other level of complexity. The spectrum of the effect is broad, and needs to be honored.

Today the 4th issue of Gazillion Voices hit the newsstand that is the Internet. It’s well worth reading (and listening to the podcasts, looking at the photo essays, reflecting on the articles).

So go read this brand new issue of Gazillion Voices, and urge others to do the same. Post your comments. Engage in dialogue. Enjoy the opportunity to listen, learn, and be challenged.

My view of National Adoption Awareness Month: “Awareness of adoption” cannot be limited to making people aware that children need families. It has to cover a much larger scale, including awareness of issues such as grief, trauma, and loss, as well as racial identity, cultural realities, search and reunion issues. My hope is that children who genuinely need new families find them, that the adoption preparation process completed by adoptive parents is thorough and challenging, that the first/birth families receive thorough, transparent, and thoughtful (non-coerceive in any way) counseling and support, before, during, and after the placement, and that the experiences of adoptees, whether positive or negative, are respected as real. My hope is that legislators, policymakers, moviemakers, and others involved in adoption will listen especially closely to the voices of adopted adults and of first/birth parents. That would be genuine Adoption Awareness.

20131103-090707.jpg